IP Video Backbone Of Security System At Belgium Courthouse

Feb 28, 2008

An IP video CCTV system is providing the technology behind a Fabricom-GTI integrated security solution for the new courthouse in the Belgium city of Ghent. The project integrates CCTV, video-intercom and access control into a single IP-security system. By using the IP video system to provide fully-featured video-intercom facilities IndigoVision has created a scalable and cost-effective solution by eliminating traditional intercom switching hardware.

The new 600,000 square foot courthouse in Ghent is operated by the Belgian Ministry of Justice and consists of a fully-secure environment that houses holding cells, court rooms, hearing rooms and offices, with public areas running throughout. The security facilities are used by the police, Ministry of Justice security staff and personnel manning the reception desk. The system was designed and installed by IndigoVision’s local partner and integrator Fabricom-GTI.

The IndigoVision software development kit enabled a tight integration of IndigoVision’s hardware and Control Center IP video and alarm management software in ICAROS, Fabricom-GTI's security and building management system.

Alongside access control, intruder and fire detection and other building related systems, an ICAROS workstation gives the operator seamless access to all the unique IndigoVision features for alarm and video management.

The integration offers the end-user significant benefits. Whenever an alarm is generated the nearest camera feed is automatically displayed on a monitor and recorded. An alarm can be generated from CCTV camera motion detection, access control points, video-intercom units or from the intruder and fire detection systems. Operators can also manually select camera views for display and recording. Eight IndigoVision Windows-based NVR workstations are used to record the camera and intercom video at 4SIF, 25 fps, as well as the two-way audio from the intercom units.

The combination of the video management software and the IP-network creates a ‘virtual network’ which provides unlimited camera switching combinations, overcoming the severe limitations of the traditional analog CCTV matrix. This allows complete flexibility and scalability for the future. Traditional video-intercom systems typically use a central switching matrix that requires separate cabling from each intercom unit. By fully integrating the video, audio and I/O from each intercom unit into the IP Video system, this switching hardware is eliminated and the benefits of the ‘virtual matrix’ can also be applied to the video-intercom.

Video from 83 fixed and PTZ CCTV cameras and 34 video-intercom cameras, which are compact cameras built into the door intercom units, are connected to IndigoVision’s 8000 transmitter/receiver modules. The 8000 converts the analog feed into high-quality MPEG-4 digital video for transmission over the IP network.

In addition high-quality two-way audio and I/O from the intercom units are also connected to the 8000 units for compression and transmission. The 8000 units have built-in analytics including motion detection, which is used to trigger an alarm when scene activity is detected. Running real-time analytics at the camera significantly reduces bandwidth requirements on the network and ensures the system is totally scalable.